Giovanni was Steve Reeves' main stuntman / body double. They share a brief scene just before this one. It's always funny to see the two together, which happened in a couple of other films. We're introduced to the two main females characters for this film, Ombretta and Gianna Maria. Gianna always makes a great entrance. Her character is sorta unfocused (needed more scenes) but she added so much to the film's overall worth. The film was directed by Sergio Corbucci, who also directed another Steve Reeves films, DUEL OF THE TITANS (1961). I prefer this one over DUEL. As a PEPLUM fan, this one is so much more satisfying.
Wasn't there a long PEPLUM fight/wrestling scene featuring Giovanni Cianfrigli? Can't remember from where though..
ReplyDeleteIt's another film, HERCULES THE AVENGER
ReplyDeleteThank you for posting that video as well. Is there anything that you don't know about PEPLUM? You are the BEST! Simply awesome!
DeleteI agree this is a really first rate Peplum. With a cast that good (plus location shooting in Egypt) it could hardly fail.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I do not think Gianna's character deserved to die in the desert. As a Roman lady she treated her slave girl no worse than most other Patrician women.
Gianna specialized in depicting Patrician ladies who were cruel to their female slaves. Examples include THE WARRIOR AND THE SLAVE GIRL, SINS OF ROME, and THE SLAVE OF CARTHAGE.
This latter movie is AKA THE SWORD AND THE CROSS. It should not be confused with an entirely different film with the same title staring Yvonne de Carlo as Mary Magdalene.
I like this film but I read that Steve didn't. I also read that the director had used innovative shots and angles as when the cruel Crassus kills a rebel throwing him into the eels (Steve's eyes), another good shot, for me, is when Randus and the rebels cross a fortified bridge after a raid (44:50), the camera angle, the sun, the smoke, the iron mask, the warriors, etc. maybe it influenced in some way a film like Mad Max II. Well, there are several other good scenes. On the other hand, I didn't also like the end of Gianna (she's very beautiful and didn't do anything so terrible to die that way).
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